{
 "no": 46,
 "id": "case-46",
 "sk": 20250318,
 "year": 2025,
 "date": "2014 to 2025 (cumulative)",
 "cat": "Public money",
 "sev": "amber",
 "title": "₹16 lakh crore written off. About 16% recovered.",
 "stamp": "Public money, quietly erased",
 "human": {
  "v": "Borne by public-sector banks and, ultimately, ordinary depositors and taxpayers",
  "est": false
 },
 "cost": {
  "v": "~<b>₹16.35 to 16.61 lakh cr</b> in bad loans written off since 2014; only about <b>16%</b> recovered; roughly <b>₹9.26 lakh cr</b> of it owed by big industry",
  "est": true
 },
 "what": "Indian banks wrote off around ₹16.6 lakh crore in bad loans since 2014, according to RBI data given in an RTI reply and in Parliament, of which only about 16 percent has been recovered. The bulk, roughly ₹9 lakh crore, was owed by large industry and services.",
 "dodge": "Write-offs are, as the government insists, prudential accounting rather than formal waivers, yet the pattern is hard to stomach: colossal sums of public-bank money erased, overwhelmingly for big corporate borrowers, with recovery stuck near a sixth, while the borrowers' identities stay shielded under the RBI Act. The gulf between how gently large defaulters are treated and how hard small ones are chased has never been honestly answered.",
 "ministers": [
  {
   "n": "Nirmala Sitharaman",
   "r": "Finance Minister"
  },
  {
   "n": "Reserve Bank of India",
   "r": "Banking regulator"
  }
 ],
 "pos": "The government says write-offs are accounting measures, that borrowers remain liable, that recovery is an ongoing process, and that gross NPAs have since fallen to multi-year lows.",
 "alt": "Publish the names of big defaulters, pursue corporate recovery as relentlessly as small-borrower recovery, and account transparently for exactly what public money was lost and to whom.",
 "sources": [
  {
   "label": "₹16.61 lakh cr written off since 2014, 16% recovered",
   "url": "https://www.nationalheraldindia.com/business/banks-write-off-rs-1661-lakh-crore-in-loans-since-2014-recovery-stands-at-16-pc",
   "tier": 3,
   "archiveUrl": "http://web.archive.org/web/20260505221216/https://www.nationalheraldindia.com/business/banks-write-off-rs-1661-lakh-crore-in-loans-since-2014-recovery-stands-at-16-pc"
  },
  {
   "label": "₹16.35 lakh cr over a decade, bulk to big industry",
   "url": "https://www.moneylife.in/article/rs1635-lakh-crore-bad-loans-written-off-by-banks-in-past-10-years-govt/76651.html",
   "tier": 2,
   "archiveUrl": "http://web.archive.org/web/20260502063909/https://www.moneylife.in/article/rs1635-lakh-crore-bad-loans-written-off-by-banks-in-past-10-years-govt/76651.html"
  }
 ],
 "estimates": {
  "costInrCrore": 1661000
 },
 "caseUrl": "https://whoisresponsible.xyz/case/case-46/"
}